The battery in the Blade CX is a 2 cell battery and the battery in the Blade 400 is 3 cell so thats not going to happen. The speed controller on the CX would probably go up in smoke as soon as you plugged in a 3 cell battery.

Ok then...what's a good make for a replacement battery for the 400? You've got one of those don't you Hance? What's the flight time on it like? I think I'm gonna get mine in a couple of weeks on my next pay.

For those that fought for it, freedom has a taste that the protected will never know.-Unknown Veteran

I am still just learning to fly the 400 and do a lot of landing and taking off again. SecretSquirrel is really the person to ask when it comes to the 400. I only have the stock E Flite batteries so I dont know what a good replacement battery would be. Your flight times are a little short but not bad. Have you checked to make sure nothing is binding anywhere and used a good quality lube like KY on all the moving parts ?

I can hover the 400 and do a little forward flight thats the size of it. TriFlo seems to be the lube of choice for almost all helicopter people if you can find it. It wont eat the plastic like some oils will. Most hardware shops and hobby shops carry the TriFlo brand.

Hoser wrote:What would be a good replacement battery for my Blade CX2? 6 minutes of flight time sucks. I'd like something (if possible) that can be used in a Blade 400 3D too. All the hobby shops around here only carry e-flite replacement batteries, and can't tell me what to get that would increase my flying time.

Unfortunately, the BCX2 and the Blade 400 use significantly different batteries. You won't be able to get one the can be used for both. The CX2 uses a two cell 7.4V battery and the B400 uses a three cell 11.1V battery. I don't know what to recommend for extending you flight times as you are pretty constrained on the size of the battery for the BCX2 and assuming everything else is in working order, the only way to get longer flight times is to get a high capacity battery, which generally means physically larger. All that said, if you are looking are replacement batteries, I get mine from Xcite battery. The have an exact replacement for the BCX2 battery.

Well, I flew it (and crashed it today). First, let me say, crashing a plane... way less painful than crashing a heli. I nosed it in from about 10' up and managed to end up with a scratched prop spinner, a bent motor shaft, and a broken motor mount. It will cost less than $10 to replace everything that needs it.

Now for flight characteristics... It is light and will take off at about 60% throttle in maybe 30'. I estimate it will fly at about 10-12mph on the low end. In flight, it seemed to be a good bit nose heavy, but after thinking about it, I'm pretty sure the battery shifted way forward during a taxi/curb incident before the flight. The lightness caused problems today as it was a a bit breezy and it turned out to be a bit much (which contributed to the crash). I didn't really the chance to get a complete feel for the controls, but I didn't find any tendency for it to be twitchy or overly sensitive to stick input yet when a gust of wind rolled it sideways I could quickly and easily right it and keep on going.

The Draganfly series of heli cams have been impressive, but the just announced X6 is freaking amazing. The triple-tipped carbon fiber body has two carbon rotors on each end. The design allows it to move in all directions rapidly, provide enough control to zip around indoors yet resist up to 18 miles per hour of wind.The oil-dampening vibration-killing mount can be loaded with an HD camera, night vision camera, still camera, low light camera or thermal imaging camera. The machine also has GPS, which feeds positioning data into the remote control's LCD. The X6 can even maintain flight if one of its 6 motors stops working. The battery can be charged in 30 minutes, yet can supply the device with 450 watts of power, which allows the machine to climb 23 feet per second, turn 90 degrees in the same time or do fly-bys at 30 MPH. I don't know how much these cost, but I'm getting enough enjoyment out of watching the videos at Dragonfly's site.

The Draganfly series of heli cams have been impressive, but the just announced X6 is freaking amazing. The triple-tipped carbon fiber body has two carbon rotors on each end. The design allows it to move in all directions rapidly, provide enough control to zip around indoors yet resist up to 18 miles per hour of wind.The oil-dampening vibration-killing mount can be loaded with an HD camera, night vision camera, still camera, low light camera or thermal imaging camera. The machine also has GPS, which feeds positioning data into the remote control's LCD. The X6 can even maintain flight if one of its 6 motors stops working. The battery can be charged in 30 minutes, yet can supply the device with 450 watts of power, which allows the machine to climb 23 feet per second, turn 90 degrees in the same time or do fly-bys at 30 MPH. I don't know how much these cost, but I'm getting enough enjoyment out of watching the videos at Dragonfly's site.

That is just cool. Of course the fact that the note the DHS is offering grants to help pay for such equipment immediately tells me I'll never be able to afford one, but the tech is still way cool.

I broke the landing gear on my vapor the other day. I was picking it up out of the box i store it in and snagged a wheel. When I did it broke the landing gear. I got right down to some serious cussing when that happened. I glued it back together and everything is good again.

Well, I got to fly the 330L a bit more. I put a new, much stronger tail wheel on it and built a much better motor mount. I also replaced the cheap bent wire landing gear with some nice aluminum ones with real wheel which I attached to some 4-40 studs I had epoxied into the body. It flew very very well. Only needed about 3 clicks of up elevator to trim out and it would fly hands off. In normal circuits, there was no need for me to use the left stick at all. It was very well behaved with just elevator and aileron. It would cruise at half throttle very well. Then I decided to see how it would handle dead stick since I had no idea how long a battery pack would actually last. A light, fairly high drag styro plane does not dead stick well AT ALL. That ended the flight as I snapped the prop shaft and tore a landing gear stud out of the body. Actually, considering I got back in the air for $2.60 (the cost of the prop shaft) and a little epoxy to fix the stud, it really wasn't that bad.

Yesterday evening I was flying at the school where my wife teaches, and something happened. I'm not sure what, though I think the aileron servo may have slipped as it was not epoxied into it's cutout. Banking into a turn, it nosed over and spiraled into the ground at about 25mph. It is now an ex-330XL. Foam may survived abuse a bit better than balsa, but foam, especially EPS (styro) will snap under serious load. The plane is a complete structural loss.

The fuse snapped right about the spar of the main wing, between the front and rear access hatches. The wing broke clean through in one place and about 2/3rd of the way through in another.

It completely ripped the gear and the front of the battery box out of the fuse.

Despite the nose damage, the motor appears to be ok, or will be once I replace the shaft.

The canopy was removable, and it actually snapped it both where the hold down screw sits, and further back.

Luckily, all the electronics survived completely unscathed, barring the motor shaft of course. Soooo.... off the the local hobby shop to find an ARF body in which to put all the electronics. This is what I ended up with.

It is made of Elapor foam which while not quite as stiff as EPS, withstands impact a lot better. Wing span is 36" and final flying weight will be around 29oz. I'm going to start the build this evening, but just opening the box, I was impressed with the packing.

I also looked at the ARF version of the Multiplex Magister . However, at over 64" wingspan, it is a bit larger than I have ready area for flying and it would have been questionable whether I could have flown it with the brushless motor I had for the 330L due to the Magister being almost three times as heavy, so I went for the Gemini. I will probably get the Acromaster sometime in the future.

This is the best I've been able to find about what Elapor is actually made of, and this is random web knowledge mind you so no guarantees on accuracy.

Elapor is a proprietary blend of EPS and EPP. Its closest relative Arcel is about 70% EPP and the two seem about the same. So that is the mix I'd go with. Elapor is more rigiid than EPP and takes glue better. Like EPP, Elapor is moldable.

On a side note, it is always amusing when you come across your own posts researching stuff on Google.

Sucks you piled up your plane after only a couple of flights. Crashes from equipment failure suck way worse than a crash from dumb thumbs if you ask me.

Gorilla glue is great, it's a polyurethane glue that foams when you mix it with water. You can get any generic polyurethane glue and it will stick well to EPP, EPS, and all of the major foams that this hobby uses.

I got a Blade CP Pro on hold for me. I was looking at the Blade 400, but those kits cost $279 and don't include a transmitter, receiver, battery or receiver. That's gonna add another $300 to the price for the kit. And that's with a bottom of the line Spektrum transmitter. I figure I'll get this CP Pro and save up for a better one later.

edit - changed Spot to SS

Last edited by Hoser on Mon Sep 01, 2008 1:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

For those that fought for it, freedom has a taste that the protected will never know.-Unknown Veteran

SpotTheCat wrote:Ok secretsquirrel... looking at those pictures of that foamy again, it looks repairable. Glue and tape and she'll fly again.

However, if its handling qualities aren't so fun, you might be happier with the biplane anyways.

I might could have repaired it, however the motor mount was crushed into the noise about an inch in a nice U shape. The flight characteristics, other than dead-stick, were actually pretty good, but not worth trying to repair.

I spent a bit of time this weekend building the Gemini.

Even the packaging was impressive. Gotta love German engineering.

Dry fitting some of the pieces to see how it's going to look.

Turns out that the parts were so well molded that the whole thing would hold together well enough to be moved around, with no glue.

Build pretty well complete, but the radio and power haven't been installed yet.

"Bubba" is my addition, as well as much of the cockpit detailing: leather seat (with stitching), blue trim, etc.

This is my first ARF build, though I have built free flight and non flying balsa models from kits in the past, including a 6ft glider. I had forgotten how much fun it is. The kit was a breeze to build, other than being permanently scared I was going to glue my fingers together. Elapor foam is glued with CA. It probably took me about six hours, which included the detailing.

I made a few minor changes as I went along. I replaced the plastic/glass wing spar with a carbon fiber one to save some weight. Then I went and added the weight back by using scale tires instead of the molded foam ones that shipped with the kit. I also spent a fair amount of time detailing the cockpit.

I finished the build this evening, but I haven't uploaded the final pictures yet. Actually, I have some more detailing work to do, but as this point it is flyable. If I can, I'll post the final details tomorrow. Unfortunately, shakedown flights will have to wait as we are dealing with the western edge of the remnants of Gustav and are expecting 25-30mph wind gusts through the weekend.

I like the addition of "Bubba" there SS, but I do notice that he has no legs. That's gonna make rudder control a bit of a hassle don't you think?

I got my CP Pro today, and wow what a difference. Just the weight of the thing compared to the CX2 is enough to know that I'm now using a better heli. All pre-flight checks worked out good, and it's a nice calm day outside, so I think I'll head down to the park and test this thing out. Hopefully I won't have to make a trip back to the hobby store to get replacement parts for the broken ones. Wish me luck.

For those that fought for it, freedom has a taste that the protected will never know.-Unknown Veteran

Hoser wrote:I like the addition of "Bubba" there SS, but I do notice that he has no legs. That's gonna make rudder control a bit of a hassle don't you think?

I got my CP Pro today, and wow what a difference. Just the weight of the thing compared to the CX2 is enough to know that I'm now using a better heli. All pre-flight checks worked out good, and it's a nice calm day outside, so I think I'll head down to the park and test this thing out. Hopefully I won't have to make a trip back to the hobby store to get replacement parts for the broken ones. Wish me luck.

I have hung out with a lot of heli pilots. I dont want to jinx you but if you can fly the Blade CP you can fly anything.

Blade CP Pro box wrote:Every heli is flight tested and ready to fly right out of the box

They are full of crap. Everything looked good at the house. The blades were level, the tail didn't seem to want to stray either direction...everything looked good. Until I got to the park. I found a spot with freshly cut grass for a takeoff point, practically no wind, everything seemed ok, until I throttled up for lift off. The thing just fell over on it's right side. So I check to make sure the gear didn't get caught on something that I missed.....nothing there. Let's try again. Slowly throttle up...everything looks to be ok.....a little more throttle.....it starts to tilt to the right again. Check the swash plate to make sure everything's connected and tight...everything's fine. Let's try adjusting the trim a little to the left to counteract this.....throttle up again....we have lift off!!!!!!! Not a completely stable hover, but it's under control. Still wants to lean right, so I think I'm gonna have to look into that a little further as I had to trim it quite a bit to get it to this point. The flight lasted (approximately) a good 10 minutes before the battery started to die out. Nothing fancy....just some forward flying and basic turns. I did accidentally flip the idle up switch though. that was kinda scary. The thing shot up like a rocket to about 50 feet before I flipped it back to normal and prayed it didn't just come crashing down. I think I'm gonna like this. I'm glad it's more of an outside heli as flying the CX2 in the house is getting really boring.

For those that fought for it, freedom has a taste that the protected will never know.-Unknown Veteran

All single rotor helis lean to the right at least a little bit. Even real helicopters do. Its worse when you are in ground effect so the best thing you can do is get it up a couple of feet as fast as you can and stay in control.

Hance wrote:All single rotor helis lean to the right at least a little bit. Even real helicopters do. Its worse when you are in ground effect so the best thing you can do is get it up a couple of feet as fast as you can and stay in control.

Good to know...thanx Hance. I'm just concerned that I had to trim it almost half way before it became (mostly) stable. That seems a little excessive to me, but I just might be paranoid. I might spring for the aluminum swash plate and some other aluminum accessories for it to give it some bling factor.

For those that fought for it, freedom has a taste that the protected will never know.-Unknown Veteran

When you trim the heli make sure you arent in ground effect. If you trim in ground effect once you get up in the air a few feet your trim will be out of whack again. If I remember right the general rule of thumb is time and a half the rotor diameter to be out of ground effect.

I took my CX2 and Vapor to show and tell today for my 5 year old. I think he has the top show and tell for the year now

Hance wrote:All single rotor helis lean to the right at least a little bit. Even real helicopters do. Its worse when you are in ground effect so the best thing you can do is get it up a couple of feet as fast as you can and stay in control.

Good to know...thanx Hance. I'm just concerned that I had to trim it almost half way before it became (mostly) stable. That seems a little excessive to me, but I just might be paranoid. I might spring for the aluminum swash plate and some other aluminum accessories for it to give it some bling factor.

Even with Hance's follow up comment, I would consider trim at the halfway point to be bad. The trim will change (especially with the tail) as the battery runs from full to empty, but the aileron trim should be fairly static. I'm not familiar with the head on the CP, but check both the servo arm/connecting rods and the blade tracking. Servos should be close to 90 degrees as possible at mid stick. If not, take the arm off and reposition. Then, you want to adjust the links so that the swash is level (visually level is good enough). On a digital radio, I would consider anything more than about 4 clicks of trim to be a problem with a heli. But then my most frequently used tool in rebuilding a head is a pair of calipers. I'm kind of anal about it, but then my B400 has almost no vibration either (at least when it hasn't just been crashed).

Be warned. The really dangerous point is when you get comfy with basic hover, forward/back, left/right, and start to try more advanced things. It is very easy to get way too confident... It drives up the parts budget.

As far as "Bubba" goes, yes he is missing legs, and I thought about getting a GI Joe or something, but I'm already at 30oz AUW which is 2oz over the stated weight. Plus, I only have 28oz static thrust from the power setup. Not a huge deal as I have no intention of anything other than sport flying and basic aerobatics for a while, but I'm already under powered and really don't want to add any more weight.

I have a bit more detail work to do, then I'll post pics and final stats.

Hance wrote:SS I wouldn't really call 28oz of thrust and a flying weight of 30oz under powered. That thing should really move even if it doesn't have unlimited vertical.

Quite true. Actually, at least of on the only docs I have found lists the AUW as 29.6oz which would put me right on the money. Still, It won't have an unlimited vertical which means I can't just point it up and gun it to get out of a stick situation. I have to actually fly it. At 3.66 sq ft of wing area though, even if I end up adding a couple of ounces for trim, I'd still be at only about 8.7oz/sq ft so it should fly pretty well at slow speed. Right now, I have a 10x5E prop on it which gives a pitch speed of about 37mph with the motor I have. If I need a little more speed, I also have a 10x6 prop which will give me a 43mph pitch speed, but drops the thrust to 26oz. Right now, I'd rather have higher thrust and lower speed till I find out how it handles. Right now, I'm looking at 88.9W/oz.

Looks like I may actually get to fly it this weekend. The wind is suppose to be light.

Hance wrote:SS I wouldn't really call 28oz of thrust and a flying weight of 30oz under powered. That thing should really move even if it doesn't have unlimited vertical.

Quite true. Actually, at least of on the only docs I have found lists the AUW as 29.6oz which would put me right on the money. Still, It won't have an unlimited vertical which means I can't just point it up and gun it to get out of a stick situation. I have to actually fly it. At 3.66 sq ft of wing area though, even if I end up adding a couple of ounces for trim, I'd still be at only about 8.7oz/sq ft so it should fly pretty well at slow speed. Right now, I have a 10x5E prop on it which gives a pitch speed of about 37mph with the motor I have. If I need a little more speed, I also have a 10x6 prop which will give me a 43mph pitch speed, but drops the thrust to 26oz. Right now, I'd rather have higher thrust and lower speed till I find out how it handles. Right now, I'm looking at 88.9W/oz.

Looks like I may actually get to fly it this weekend. The wind is suppose to be light.

--SS

Chop off one of the wings, nearly double the wing loading, and have a better time in the wind